Tuesday, February 07, 2012

The History of Weather on Google Maps

Weather Underground's WunderMap now allows the user to view historical weather records on a Google Map.

A calendar control above the map allows the user to select a date and view the historical weather records for that day. The records include radar, storm reports and even weather related photographs and webcam images taken on that day.

WeatherSpark also lets you view historical weather on a Google Map, giving you access to the historical records of over 4,000 weather stations.

If you want to know what the weather was like in Honolulu on the day of Barack Obama's birth in August 1961 all you have to do is use the time-line to bring up the correct date, and centre the map on Honolulu. You can then view the recorded weather for that day (a balmy 30 degrees centigrade).

As well as the map view WeatherSpark has an impressive time-line interface that allows the user to visualise changing temperatures, precipitation and cloud cover through time.

save your labels. my point was that this is an election year, and elevating your candidate's birth to the importance of a historical event is a form of advertisement. for example, you could have used the birth of albert einstein, or gandhi, or any number of other historical events as an example. but to specifically choose to give an example about an active political candidate -- during an election year -- smacks of favoritism and free advertising.

as for the 'birther' controversy, it was created by obama, himself. when he pre-emptively asked the state of hawaii to seal his birth records, that's when it all started. the ensuing debate has been very good for business ;)